We’re smack bang in the depths of winter now and July often brings the coldest, bleakest and most unsettled weather.

Northern NZ today and tonight will be dealing with a deepening low which, on top of an already windy squash zone, will make things even windier.

Generally speaking gusts to gale force (60 to 90km/h) are most likely between Whangarei and Whangaparaoa later today and tonight (with most gusts around the 40 to 70km/h mark). There may be some gusts that go beyond 100km/h in the more extreme eastern coastal areas most exposed to SE winds.

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Conditions ease on Tuesday as the low tracks out east of East Cape then Wednesday and Thursday are calmer for most.

However, by Thursday windier nor’westers develop in Southland and then by Friday they spread up the country – peaking in the North Island by Saturday.

These north to north west winds look likely to reach severe gale, maybe damaging, in some areas. Usual candidates for the strongest winds are inland areas to the east of both main islands and around Central NZ / Cook Strait area.

Friday/Saturday is too far out to lock in with precise certainty, so we’ll continue to fine tune which regions are most at risk for gales and which regions will be sheltered, in the coming days. However the latest modelling is showing a surge of windy weather this Friday and Saturday right across NZ with gales and possibly severe gales forming.

We’ll confirm more details as the week goes on. For now, keep up to date with your HOURLY wind speed and GUST forecasts over at www.RuralWeather.co.nz – we have every nook and cranny of NZ covered, not just the main centres!